


Other Notable No Moons

by Tikor



Series: Castebook: No Moon [9]
Category: Exalted
Genre: Gen, Lunars, Roleplaying Character, Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-23
Updated: 2018-03-23
Packaged: 2019-04-06 17:40:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14062026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tikor/pseuds/Tikor
Summary: A practical academy of Full Moon characters.





	Other Notable No Moons

**Author's Note:**

> The Silver Shadow marked in color by the superlative kazimo! We used  
> [their Tumblr](http://kazimo.tumblr.com) to get in touch for the commission.

**The Silver Shadow**  
The Silver Shadow’s totem is a gray lioness, and she takes after it in both form and mind. Her natural inclination is to hunt, but not just for her own sake; she shares in her kills, which often have a higher purpose than simply sharpening her claws. She’s of middle age for a Lunar, no longer a pup yet not an elder. She enjoys status as a sorcerer of deep knowledge within the Crossroads Society due to her tutelage at Raksi’s side. Most of her time is spent retrieving new Lunars, taking on pups of the No Moon variety, and tattooing Lunars of all Castes after watching their trials. She’s racked up quite a list of favors doing so, especially from the elders in the North, the direction she favors, such as The Marked Wolf who was once her mentor.

Her once-packmate and lover, the late Conecco, wished upon his deathbed that she learn the secrets to mastering the demons that leak from their cage through to Creation so that none would suffer as he did. He succumbed to a supernaturally poisoned wound when the two of them tracked down a second circle demon, Mikonos, that infiltrated their shared territory. While they did manage to send her back to Malfeas, it was not before The Silver Shadow’s Emerald Banishment failed. Stunned by this superior demon’s ability to evade her sorcery, Conecco defended her by taking the demon’s unexpected strike. 

Now a Celestial Circle Sorcerer, armed with Sapphire Banishment, she hunts demons, retrieves pups, and watches for foes entering from the edges of the world as a member of the Wardens of Gaia. She considers herself more of an interior enforcer, only venturing into the Wyld and picking fights when every hand is called to the offensive and the Swords are offering a suitable favor in return. That she did not fully pledge herself to the Swords after The Marked Wolf’s urging is a point of contention between them that both women do their best not to mention. Two factions, their demands of good standing and political baggage, are quite enough for her. The Silver Shadow’s cultivation for the Swords under The Mark Wolf’s tutelage certainly colors her view within the Wardens. Unlike most Wardens who take an active role shaping the creatures under their protection, The Silver Shadow lets nature take its course while weeding out rogue elements such as mad gods, stray demons, or Fae - overseeing Creation more like a game preserve than a genetics project.

 **Spirit of Sunset**  
Spirit of Sunset knew he was meant to treat with the spirits for as long as he could remember. But only recently has he entertained the idea of doing so as an equal.

Spirit of Sunset was born in a small fishing village on the same day that the fishermen netted a pelagothrope. It was beaten to death, roasted on a fire, then fed to the hogs, as was customary. But seeing evidence of the Wyld, however nonthreatening, reminds even the most cynical men that there are powers greater than themselves at work in Creation - and thus time to take on the burden of expanding the shamanship. Spirit of Sunset was promised to the shaman of the village as an apprentice, and his mother and father received tribute while they cared for him in the form of daily fish and bread.

The old shaman spent more time with him as a child than his parents did. They took the omens to heart, keeping their distance from their third child, instead favoring their first two. They did their duty more as wet nurse and disciplinarian than as parents. Spirit of Sunset grew up thinking this was normal, and gravitated to the shaman who showed him praise and affection for learning the stories and rituals of his trade propitiating the gods.

One prayer for rain to the elementals, one prayer at sunset to the Unconquered Sun requesting he return the lifegiving Daystar the next day, one prayer to Luna that she keep the moon’s phases regular, one prayer for the shore court to keep the ocean at bay, another for the ocean court to keep the catch in our waters, yet another for Uvanaru, may he bless the entire village with good health. Spirit of Sunset learned them all under the patient tutelage of the shaman. Then Spirit of Sunset would walk down to the stream for sweet water and tomorrow’s firewood, and they would lunch and sup from the villages’ tribute roasted by the shaman.

Everything seemed to go according to plan. Yet Luna, the Fickle Lady, revels in dashing the best laid plans. When the shaman died, Spirit of Sunset slipped easily into the old man’s role. Most gods did not notice the difference, enacting ceremony with Spirit of Sunset as if he were the old shaman himself. When Luna appeared to Spirit of Sunset in her thousandth face, he knew her as the goddess of the moon by her silver hair and moonlight aura. Delighted to be recognized, she touched him, and his Anima blazed over the entire village.

The village was remote, on the Western edge of the Northern Threshold, but still close enough to the Deshan states to have elements of the Immaculate Philosophy mixed into their Hundred Gods Heresy. As the only holy man of the village, Spirit of Sunset was able to argue from authority that he was not Anathema to the suspicious and superstitious villagers, but he feared what would happen if a trader came by to contradict his story.

That conflict never came. Instead, two Lunars swam to the village’s shore one day, changed shape in front of all and sundry, then demanded to see the shaman. Spirit of Sunset was called right away. The Lunars politely asked Spirit of Sunset to come with them. When he refused, citing his role as the shaman and having no apprentice to take his place, the Lunars laughed at him. Then they clubbed him in the head and swam off with him.

So far Spirit of Sunset has been a disappointment to the Silver Pact. He has proven to be no fighter, hardly able to perform the sacred hunt, and he cannot even feed himself. His knowledge of spirits carried him through his trials and the Silver Pact marked him as a No Moon. They’ve sent him to Red Jaws for remedial training in ‘how to be’. Spirit of Sunset tries to please his quiet and stern mentor, but matters in the physical world rarely hold his attention for long. He watches the spirits wherever he goes and sees to their needs, as best as he can discern them, asking in return that they look kindly to the mortals in their domains. Together Red Jaws and Spirit of Sunset have threatened and cajoled the spirits of their territory into a harmonious prosperity for the mortals who live there not seen since the Shogunate. Each is largely unaware just how much influence the other is projecting; when they part the one who remains will either be confused at what has suddenly gone wrong, or will have to learn to appreciate and perform both roles - protector as well as shaman. 

Every night Spirit of Sunset prays to the gods of his village, one prayer for rain to the elementals, one prayer at sunset to the Unconquered Sun requesting he return the lifegiving Daystar the next day, one prayer to Luna that she keep the moon’s phases regular, one prayer for the shore court to keep the ocean at bay, another for the ocean court to keep the catch in the village’s waters, yet another for Uvanaru, may he bless the entire village with good health. One day he hopes to return to his village and train an apprentice to shaman there, as he sees is his duty.

He thinks Luna would approve.

 **So-Lu-Si**  
To the West and South of the Dreaming Sea are the great plains of hundreds of nomadic tribes. One among them, on the farthest of southern expanses, where the Wyld and Creation mix in the wind that ripples the grasses, is the San Fago tribe whose protector is the great elephant So-Lu-Si. 

Centuries ago she was Tammuz’ pup. While hearing his stories and observing his successful experiment in the Thousand Rivers, while losing every argument and every game of strategy, she asked him how he came to know so much. Tammuz simply told her, “I’ve already made so many mistakes. I remember what they were, and endeavor to make new ones. I’ve been doing that so long; it looks like knowledge to a pup such as you.”

His words stuck with her. When she struck out on her own to craft her own experiment in mortal ways she began by ritually exposing them to the Wyld. Most perished under the stresses of unreality. Many more simply changed in ways she did not find useful. But after a while she created a new strain of Wyld-changed human that could breed true in Creation. These new ones are still human in most ways, at least outwardly. Like most Southerners their skin is dark, and like Southerners bordering on the Wyld it is so dark brown as to be black. Like most Southerners their hair is red, a reflection of the Elemental Pole of Fire, and like some Southerners it is curly and close to their heads. But in their minds, they have to work to forget, instead of work to remember. Their bodies are hardened against time; they live as long in good health as the Dragon-Blooded should they avoid tragedy.

These tribesmen and tribeswomen of the San Fago live close to the land that they roam. They raise elephants for transportation, for companionship, and for meat. Owning little more per family than what one elephant can easily carry, status is determined by song and dance, by skill with the spear and quickness with a joke, and by proper reverence to the gods. They have achieved harmony with the local spirits, aided by their great elephant protector So-Lu-Si. The San Fago look down on other tribes of the great plains; they consider them children - forgetful and overtaken by youthful impulses. They war and make peace with these tribes, like any other tribe, but they rarely intermarry. So-Lu-Si takes no part in these wars. Even though she only visits every few score years, most remember her vividly. What she said, usually about judgements and values the tribe debated at the time, what she did, usually including transforming into an elephant before their eyes and treating with the gods alongside their shamen and thaumaturges, and who she brought, most often another human exposed to the same Wyld treatment as the original members of the tribe, to keep the bloodline both pure in the changes she desires but varied enough to avoid complications. So-Lu-Si believes that outside of a little divine intervention now and again, the San Fago can add to Creation on their own, making newer mistakes as their wisdom grows as individuals and as a tribe.

When not indulging in visits to her experiment, So-Lu-Si spends her time meeting with every interesting kind of folk she can and hearing their stories. Naturally most of them are Lunars. She’s been to Gatherings in every direction. She’s visited every Fair Folk court known. She watched a dozen cities recover from the Contagion, each in their own way once the old Shogunate no longer constrained them. She’s snuck atop the Imperial Mountain, attended the Scarlet Empress’ crowning ceremony, heard her words to her people once she ascended to rule, and witnessed the destruction of the Seven Tigers. When another Lunar retrieves a pup that itches to see all the world, they usually arrange for So-Lu-Si to be that pup’s mentor. 

Outside of the Winding Path to which she belongs, she gives every Lunar faction the chance to make their case to her. She listens, but rarely supports their causes. Lately, however, she’s found reason to seek out Tikor of the Sun King Seneschals. Her dreams recur with the image of a shining woman surrounded by utter shadow. From the landmarks she sees when her dream-eyes look away from the sun-shadow-woman, So-Lu-Si recognizes the area surrounding the shadowland known as the Font of Mourning. She’s heard the stories of this place but none in the first person, and dare not enter, for there are places where even So-Lu-Si’s tricks will not save her. To solve the mystery she’d like to examine one of the golden women up close. Perhaps then she can understand and banish her repetitive dreams, returning to more novel or useful ones, without venturing thousands of miles to the Font of Mourning and risking that she will not be the only Lunar to emerge alive after entering that shadowed place.

 **Silver Python**  
A relic from the First Age, as fluid as the Fickle Lady, as detached as the moon, as deadly as night. That is how Silver Python thinks of herself, and she’s convinced quite a few in the Silver Pact that she’s at least partially correct, though each Lunar picks and chooses which parts to believe. 

It is true that she survives from the High First Age, but she only spent a few centuries under Solar rule. She claims to have forgotten which sex she was born into; what else has she forgotten from that time? She spends more time assuming the forms of her Heart’s Blood than her True Forms - any who would be close to her must become experts at spotting her tells of snake-slit eyes and forked tongue. But even such dedication to variation cannot compare to the thousand faces of Luna, some say. Only her promises to Rain Deathflyer keep her at all informed on Halta’s affairs or the prosperity of the beastmen lines she has born, such as the snakemen of the East, or the intelligent animals she has crafted, such as the baboon ata-beasts of Halta. But remain involved she does. Most agree that her deadliness is legendary - every fight in living memory has ended when her bite-venom has taken her foe to unconsciousness or death at her whim. Few disagree on that.

Silver Python wearies of the dreams of humanity, even her expanded view that includes beastmen and ata-beasts. So rote, so mundane. They fail to satisfy her craving for novelty. Of late (oh, say, 300 years) she’s spent the vast majority of her time with supernatural company. Among the spirit courts of the East, she has hunted alongside Calita, feasted with Jorst, traded venoms with Arilak, and discussed strategy with Sunipa. She has partied and intrigued through the Raksha’s freeholds, seducing Slulura, Marika, and Yseult and jilting each in turn with no thought to the consequences. She even, when her gender suits, seeks out and seduces her once-pup Rain Deathflyer for that nostalgic rush. But of humanity, she spares little thought. So little that she hasn’t even heard of the Solar’s return, since for the last dozen years she’s been underground as part of a gemlord’s court attempting to wear down the old elemental into granting her the rights to a powerful underground Demesne. No one really knows what she’ll do with the information when she gets it, though Rain Deathflyer has asked the Silver Pact that when she’s seen again on the surface that he be notified to help explain the situation and prevent any unnecessary provocations towards the Sun King Senechals. 

**Rain Deathflyer**  
Rain Deathflyer is one of the three great Wardens of the East, Gaia’s own guardian, wender of the Winding Path, crafter of mind and flesh, and partner to Silver Python on their shared experiment of Halta. He is the yang to Silver Python’s yin, though they did not start out that way. He Exalted during the Usurpation, and was saved by her as she fled for the Wyld. Only over time as they became equals did his steadfastness in his convictions, words, oaths, and even physical form start to contrast markedly with Silver Python’s fluidity. 

Among the Silver Pact he’s considered an elder, but only just, being contemporary with Raksi, which suits him fine. He prefers to take on responsibilities in a considered and personal manner, not have them thrust upon him by society, even one he reveres like the Silver Pact. Silver Python was usually the one to step forth and reward a retrieval or Chimera hunting pack for their services due to how infrequently they came to Halta for a reward, and thus novel in her eyes. But in her absence Rain Deathflyer has been handing out knowledge of fleshcrafting, beastman breeding, and animal uplifting to young Lunars who meet the pack’s conditions for reward by an elder. He hopes and worries the techniques he teaches will be put to good use.

Rain Deathflyer sees Halta as a child of his mind, but takes care to hide that stance to other Lunars. He knows that Halta needs to flourish on its own, but like an overprotective parent he always convinces himself that today is not that day. When a rival Fair Folk court moves on those Fae who have allied with the Haltans, he sabotages their advances, or challenges their leader to single combat. When a new disease threatens the Haltan crop, he takes to his lab to devise a cure and sends his spirit allies out on quarantine duty. Despite this stance, the test that might break Halta or bring it to glory might already be underway. The nation’s alliance with the Bull of the North has split public opinion in all the fiefdoms of the arboreal people. Some see the Bull as the opportunity to conquer the Linowan lands once and for all, displace Jorst and his deciduous trees for Calita’s evergreen ones all the way to the Inner Sea, splitting the East between jungle and redwoods for Arilak and Calita to rule as two equals instead of the current triumvirate. Other, less zealous Haltans feel like they have bled enough in the Bull’s conquests; that dealing the Realm a blow they won’t soon forget has earned them an isolation with which they may rebuild in peace. And they are suspicious of how good a neighbor the Bull will end up being as they see the scattered peoples of Talinin lose their way, dusted by the ashes of their capital Dramasine. There is little Rain Deathflyer would do if the Haltans pursue one path or another of their own will; his love for them will not override publically contravening the expectations of the Winding Path. That said, he has made contact with the Bull, Yurgen as the ancient Lunar now calls him, and knows the strength of his Solar circle and barbarian warriors. Seeing the changes Yurgen has implemented in so short a time to the Icewalker peoples intrigues Rain Deathflyer - and he wonders if he can convince the Solar warlord to instill in his own people a respect for nature in the way of the Wardens of Gaia… or perhaps the Rain Deathflyer will ask the Bull’s next reincarnation if Yurgen proves too stubborn.

 **Ichi-ichi Nyacha**  
Ichi-ichi Nyacha, Yacha to her friends, grew up on an island so remote her mother tongue has drifted from Seatongue to something unintelligible. While her ancestors endured the Great Contagion and the Balorian Crusade, everyone else left them for dead, forgetting her island existed. 

With only a few thousand people, it was no bastion of knowledge. The ignorant people of the island had let Creation slip into legend by the time Yacha was born. To them, there was the island, the sea, and the sky. To believe in other islands was child’s fancy.

But Yacha knew there must be more. Were had the people come from? Where did the whales go when they did not swim about the island? What of the stars that moved in the sky? Where did the sun and the moon go when it was not day or when the moon was new? Yacha badgered her relatives with questions until she was beaten. But she never stopped questioning. She merely stopped looking to the people around her for answers, instead striking out on her own.

And strike out she has. When Luna touched her, Yacha left her poor island behind, swimming away in the form of a great whale herself. In the wider world she has found cities full of wonder, peers in the Silver Pact, tattoos marking her as a No Moon, and status among the Crossroads Society for her insatiable curiosity. She has also found she craves to own baubles purely for their mystery - the less she understands about them, the better. She studies them, then returns them when she knows their purpose, their history, or their value. Lately this has landed her into a bit of trouble with a certain Solar, Harmonious Jade, whose belongings she did not so cleanly steal as most others. But she hopes they can still be friends once she’s solved the puzzle of the Solar’s many talismans that she curiously does not wear when the Southerner leaves on her many missions. Oh, and returned them.

Yacha has a thick and strange accent in every language she’s learned. To explore all the cities she can in Creation she’s learned Seatongue, Firetongue, Skytongue, Riverspeak, and she’s working on Forest-tongue. In her true human form she wields two sai’s, has long black hair, skirts made of mere strips of cloth, a top snug about her breasts to facilitate swimming, Moonsilver tattoos, and a tell of webbed hands and feet. 

Lately she has been Gerd Marrow-Eater’s pup. How anyone lives on the Great Ice was a mystery to her. The right rhetorical question and and introduction at a Western Gathering later, Gerd asked her to come see for herself, and she’s spent the last few years in the frozen north learning the strange ways of the Haslanti.


End file.
